


Never Leave You Alone

by Leni



Series: Never Leave You Alone [1]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Reality, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-02
Updated: 2015-10-02
Packaged: 2018-04-24 10:20:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,138
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4915831
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Leni/pseuds/Leni
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AR. Belle welcomes her True Love back from Neverland.</p><p>  <i>He sits down first, and her knees bump against his before he slips his hands to her waist and seats her next to him.</i></p><p>  <i>"Stay," he says, as if he still believes she would leave him.</i></p><p>  <i>Belle nods anyway.</i></p><p>---</p><p>Or, the one that should be a lot angstier (because, have you <i>seen</i> that prompt?!)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Never Leave You Alone

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Classics_Lover at [Comment Fic](http://comment-fic.livejournal.com/658432.html?thread=88309760#t88309760). Prompt: **Everybody is Dead**

Belle's hand hovers on the light switch for a second before she thinks better of it and sets it back down. It takes her eyes a moment to discern the shapes within the dim room, too used to the brightness of the guest room she's just vacated.

There are over a dozen lamps, all brightly lit, standing guard over Henry's sleep. No shadow could think to hide there.

Here, all the shadows are familiar to the occupant of the room, and they are pulled together into a blanket of darkness. Rumpelstiltskin has always felt more comfortable under its cover.

"May I?" she asks, voice low to avoid wakening the sleeping boy in the next room.

"Of course." If there's a nod, she doesn't see it. "Close the door, please."

The light from the hallway becomes a sliver behind her, and then it disappears as she closes the door shut. For a second she is back in a lonely dungeon - in several of them, really - with nothing but darkness around her. There's the sting of panic, but it fades as the sound of her name reaches her ears.

Shaking away the old fears, Belle follows memory more than sight and makes her way to the great bed. She manages a few steps on her own, but falters at a loss at what she thinks is the middle of the room. 

"Rumple?"

There's the sound of a body shifting to rise from a mattress. Three slow steps that sound more exhausted than whenever they were accompanied by the thud of a cane. Then Rumpelstiltskin is standing next to her, for all she can't see him, and his hand comes sliding through hers, guiding her closer and over to their destination.

He sits down first, and her knees bump against his before he slips his hands to her waist and seats her next to him.

"Stay," he says, as if he still believes she would leave him.

Belle nods anyway.

They haven't had a moment alone together since he and Henry returned to Storybrooke. For all she stood at his side for the whole afternoon, there'd been a bewildered town demanding their attention, and then a procession of grieving friends who didn't know whether to blame the Dark One for their losses or to thank him for at least bringing Henry back.

"What now?"

As an answer, the weight of his arm settles around around her shoulders, and her body is pulled against his. It's not subtle, this way he needs her, but Belle figures he doesn't need to pretend he's on top of everything with her. 

There will be time enough to present the pantomime before the others. 

Belle is quick to press tight against him. Her hands fist around his shirt, and finally the right one slips underneath, making short work of the buttons in its quest to rest against his skin and feel his heartbeat beneath her palm.

When that isn't enough, she arranges herself so her head lies on his chest, and the steady thrum makes her smile.

It's a reassuring sound.

"Will you tell me?"

She feels him shake his head, and his hands tighten at her side.

"Henry told me a little," she says, because he needs to know now. There's a whole town who cares for the boy, but only one witness who can unburden him. "He thinks it's his fault."

The word he expels is filthy and too appropriate.

She waits in silence, unwilling to press him. Enough people have shouted questions at him today, and they had shouted more loudly when Rumpelstiltskin didn't give the answers they wanted. He'd born their anger well, appearing unaffected even under the more suspicious stares.

Only Belle had noticed that his sharp retorts were too brittle, his dismissing mannerisms too wild. And she worried, because Rumpelstiltskin never played the heartless dark wizard so well as when he needed to hide some private grief beneath the mask.

But grief for the dead? He hadn't been close to any on that doomed party.

Belle had wondered until the short conversation with Henry clued her in.

"Henry says..." she starts, almost backpedaling. Then she takes a deep breath, rubbing her cheek against his shirt in silent apology, and forges ahead. If it's the truth, better that he talk about it. "He says he saw his father, there."

Henry's father. 

Sometimes Baelfire, sometimes Neal Cassidy. 

Always Rumpelstiltskin's son.

A choked sob escapes him.

"Ah."

She has hoped that it was another manifestation of Henry's muddled memories of the last few days. There can't be consolation enough, she knows. She can't begin to understand how it must have felt, to see his son after believing him dead, just to lose him again.

The last time they had news of Baelfire's death, Belle had barely had time to do more than hold him and try to reassure him that he wasn't alone. Now there's no rush to travel to another world. He isn't boarding a ship and leaving her behind.

And Belle still has no idea what to say.

She settles for pushing lightly against his chest, guiding him to lay down and following over to nestle against him. If there are words fit for this moment, she doesn't know them. But she trusts that honest affection can make up for a whole speech.

Rumpelstiltskin takes a few shuddering breaths, fingers digging into her hip and only loosening when she doesn't protest at the pain. His other hand comes up to rest among her hair, absently spinning a strand around his thumb just to let it loose and start over.

It would be easy to fall asleep like this, in the arms of her True Love.

Belle counts his heartbeats, and reminds herself that the darkness is not a sign of her captivity but rather the protection he chooses.

She waits.

Eventually, the tale pours out.

"David was first. Poison." His hand comes briefly to rest against hers, laying above his heart, and Belle understands he means the same poison that almost killed him a few weeks ago. "I've no idea why they left it for so long," he tells her, sounding honestly puzzled, "They kept being delayed, I guess. By the time they got to the cure, it could deal with the poison but not heal the damage. It... wasn't easy."

Belle shudders at the picture in her mind. Fighting the ogres had left too many men dying from festering wounds and the fever that came after an amputation didn't take. Her status had shielded her from the worst of it, but even her brief visits to the infirmary carrying clean bandages and what little medicine remained had shown her the truth of it.

Better a quick death on the battlefield, than the slow torture of clinging to life when there was no hope.

"The princess was next."

He doesn't go into details, and Belle is grateful. She didn't know the royal couple beyond a few meetings while she'd been cursed with Lacey's personality, but she understands True Love enough to piece together what had to come next: it's easy to become careless when your heart is breaking. Easy enough to fall into a queen's trap - or to be too slow against a deadly blow.

"Poor Emma," she whispers. She hadn't known the older woman either, but she's heard the tale of how she was reunited with her parents several times. "To lose both of them..."

"Well, didn't have too much time to mourn properly, did she?"

Belle lets the snide tone slide. Sometimes he needs such little cruelties to harden his heart against the things that could hurt him.

Instinctively, she knows who came next, and searches for his hand to hold it tight. "You don't need to continue now," she tells him.

His chuckle makes her shiver, but his fingers dig deep into the back of her hand. "Now or never, dearie."

 _Never, please,_ she almost says.

But it must be his choice.

"He came for his boy, Bae did," he starts after a moment of silence. Like father, like son. Of course. "Turns out he'd been in Neverland before, almost from the start." He giggles, a sound of frustration that Belle must soothe with a brief kiss against his chest. He thanks her with a soft slide of his hand down her back. "Don't you see, Belle? I'd been looking for a way into this land, and he'd always been one portal away. It could drive a man to madness," he confesses.

Belle doesn't have an answer except to press herself closer, thread a leg over his to pin him down to reality and remind him he's not alone.

"He shouldn't have trusted Emma to handle Pan's shadow. Magic comes with control, and hers... All raw power and too grieved to aim it well. If only I'd made it in time..." His hand fists and thumps against the mattress in frustrated anger. "But Bae had sent me away, and I actually thought we needed the space. He was _alive_ ,and that was enough." He laughs bitterly. "I thought we'd have time. I thought he'd be _safe_ , if I kept Pan busy." He falls into silence again, probably running all the possible scenarios in his head. Henry had done the same, wondering about the hundred things he could have done differently.

Belle doesn't believe in what-ifs. But neither does she regret her choices.

Rumpelstiltskin is the one who never forgets his mistakes

"At least that took care of Hook as well," the sad tale continues, on a more sinister voice. "Didn't have to raise a finger myself."

Belle wonders if she should feel sorry for the pirate. There must have been something good in him, as he'd been willing to travel along to rescue Henry.

But showing sympathy for his enemy won't help Rumpelstiltskin now, so she shifts the subject back onto his son. "Henry will want to know what happened. To his father, I mean." When Rumpelstiltskin makes an uncomfortable noise, she hurries to add, "Not now, of course. But eventually."

"I guess."

"It's important, Rumple," Belle insists, because she's learned that anything less than a positive answer doesn't count for him. "He should know that his father wanted him safe at all costs."

That makes him jerk a little.

"Yes," he says at last. "Yes, of course."

Then, more quietly, "He should know that thing won't hurt anyone else, too."

Belle doesn't believe in revenge, but Rumpelstiltskin does. And this was about his son, his beloved Baelfire. Could she blame him for indulging in the destruction of that which had killed his boy?

Though she already knows the answer, she still asks: "What happened to it?"

"Oh," his voice drops to a satisfied purr. "I handled it." 

The three words are enough to tell her that, whatever pain a shadow could be made to suffer, it did.

"Good," Belle says.

Poor Henry is still terrified of that thing, and Belle knows she must steel herself for the barrage of nightmares that will come as a result. She has no experience dealing with children, but she knows about losing a mother right before her eyes.

"I can't believe Regina is gone," she says, still struggling with the concept. For years, Regina had held the power of life or death over Belle. To think of her now, beaten at last, should bring some satisfaction, but Belle only sees the tragedy of a life cut short when the other woman was starting to mend her ways.

"Always thought too highly of her power," Rumpelstiltskin sniffs. "Told her it'd get her into trouble, but would she listen?"

"She tried to take down Pan, then."

"Along with little Emma," Rumpelstiltskin reminds her. "Anywhere else, they might have managed... well, managed _something_ , at least. But it was Neverland." He makes a grumbling noise. "Some call it the place where dreams come true, as long as your heart believes. They never say only one dreamer gets to rule."

And Peter Pan never lost.

"They didn't have a chance." 

"No," he agrees softly, and then, hesitating, continues, "Even if I'd joined their efforts, it would have been for nothing. And _all_ would have been lost."

He expects to be condemned for that choice. Belle knows by the way his grasp loosens in preparation for her departure.

"I believe you," she tells him.

But she understands she alone will have the privilege of the whole truth. The others would blame him, brand him a coward or a killer. Henry doesn't need to hear those rumors about the closest family he's got left.

He recovers quickly, tittering as if he'd never doubted her. 

"He should have shown a little more patience, the fool. How he hoped to convince Henry to give up his heart after _that_ , I don't know." There's a thread of laughter in his voice. It reminds Belle of the times he'd come back to the castle in a good mood, crowing over teaching a lesson to someone who'd overreached themselves trying to out-trick him. "A nasty world, Neverland. It must be fed, or it will feed on the one who failed."

"It killed him?"

"No, no." He is almost giddy now. "It wasn't as kind. It just... abandoned him. All that power - whoosh! Barely worth sticking a dagger between his old ribs, at that point, though I was tempted."

Belle is glad that he was spared that, even if he's not. No child should be the one to kill their own parent.

"And then you came back."

"We did."

Everybody had rushed to the harbor as soon as the Jolly Roger was spotted. The relief had been short-lived, as none of the adults they'd been prepared to welcome back had appeared on the ramp. 

Instead a handful of dirty boys had shyly walked down, wide-eyed as they stared around the twenty-first century town. A single girl had followed, and then been swiftly swept away by her brothers. 

At the back, their faces a study of exhaustion, had stood a grandfather and his pale grandson.

Belle had been the only one to rush to meet them, already aware that something was wrong, but too relieved to see her love to hesitate. Their reunion had started with an embrace, a heartfelt whisper of her name - and a warning rasped against her ear:

"If anyone takes the boy, I'll kill them where they stand."

That was the moment when Belle had understood.

She remembers gasping in horror, and how the sound seemed to find echo around the gathered townsfolk as they also grasped the situation.

Then Rumpelstiltskin had started his way through the crowd, Henry glued at his left side while Belle took his other arm, too shocked to notice that there was no limp anymore. She'd never been so glad that people's instinctive reaction was to avoid the Dark One when he wore his ill mood as an armor.

Only Leroy had made to approach them, but his brothers had held him back.

It had taken them almost an hour to arrive at the house to demand answers, and until evening fell for the last to go away. But at least Dr. Hopper had stayed to talk with Henry rather than to make a villain out of Rumpelstiltskin for daring to survive and return to Storybrooke.

Right now they would be assembled somewhere neither she nor Rumpelstiltskin had been invited. There would be choices to be made, and unlike in the Enchanted Forest, where politics didn't affect life in the Dark Castle, here they would be expected to play along.

"What happens now?"

"We wait," he tells her, not bothering to pretend he hasn't considered the possible outcomes. "We have enough royalty to fill the empty seats. Perhaps Midas, probably George." He giggles at a joke Belle doesn't understand. "Or maybe the Ice Queen will take a shot, now that her original plan derailed to nothing."

He doesn't explain, and Belle doesn't push it. Rumpelstiltskin will have his secrets, it's been his way for too long to change now.

"Do you... have a preference?"

Belle had been locked away while he played out his part in the coming of the Dark Curse, but she's heard enough to realize that Rumpelstiltskin is owed by every major player in town.

"Well," he drawls, going back to play with her hair. "I've got a little king under my watch now, but he's too young to be bothered by all that yet."

Belle wishes she could see his face. Instead she asks carefully, "And when he grows up?"

"His inheritance, his choice. No good forcing the boy." He grows pensive, and Belle knows he's thinking about another teenager. "I _do_ learn from my mistakes."

There was a man who shouted at her for daring to confess her love, and then sent her away because he couldn't believe her.

"Yes, you do," she tells him.

He must be thinking along the same lines, because his touch falters and when he speaks, it's almost an apology.

"Belle...."

She's never liked it when Rumpelstiltskin sounds insecure. He is the most powerful man in their world, and love should only make him stronger.

"I'm so glad you came back," she hurries to tell him, feeling the need to reassure him of the fact. Blindly, her hands search for his face, sliding against the faint stubble at his chin and settling with her thumbs along his cheekbones. "I'm so, _so_ sorry about Baelfire," - and sorrier they hadn't made their peace before the end, that would eat at him for years to come - "but he wanted Henry to be safe, above all else, and there's nowhere safer than with you."

He clears his throat, as ever uncomfortable with effusive signs of affection.

Or trust.

Belle is undeterred, moving closer up his body and hoping for good aim. She ends up kissing his nose first, and giggles at the mistake before her lips lower down to his lips. At last, a lengthy kiss is teased out of him, and Belle sighs happily into it.

"I love you, Rumpelstiltskin."

It's been a few days since she said the words, but it feels like it's been so much longer. Too much has happened since they said goodbye at the port, and even before then they'd barely had time to be together.

"Never leave me behind again," she asks of him. In the dark, it's too easy to slip into memories of a lonely cell, but not when she's being held in his arms. "Where you go, I'll follow."

Not even she knows whether it's a promise or a warning.

Rumpelstiltskin shakes his head, but says nothing yet. 

He doesn't shout. He doesn't doubt her.

He pulls her closer instead.

That's answer enough for now.

 

The End  
02/10/15


End file.
